Calling All of You Who Want a Dog But Can’t Have One!

Now this is a post that is unlike anything I have ever written on my blog before. It’s something that I have wanted to write about for ages and have never got round to as I wasn’t sure you’d be interested, however, I have just decided to go for it as it is relevant to my life at the moment and is a good excuse to have a post with a load of cute pictures in!!

So, from the age of 2 years old I loved dogs, however I also was very badly allergic to them, meaning that if I was near them at all it triggered an asthma attack! Cue many years of me moping around, unable to go and play at friends houses, desperate to have some doggy attention! This carried on until I was 17 and met Tom. Now as most of you know we have now been together nearly 4 years and are inseparable, however, I wasn’t sure at first if I would be able to stay at his house at all because of his huge German Shepherd Max! Max was a very large, very hairy but very lovable dog. All of which would be likely to cause a ginormous asthma attack for me!! Now Tom is a very stubborn person and if I had told him I couldn’t come round he would not have taken no for an answer! So, over the years I took small steps to trying to adjust my body to being around dogs and very quickly I noticed I was a lot more tolerant to him and his endless amounts of fur! In the end, I pretty much became immune to his dogginess and was able to treat him like the dog I had always dreamed of owning. Now, this is just a bit of a back story for the main content of this post however, I also want to add a few pictures of the wonderful Max who sadly passed away last month. He was the ripe old age of 10 with the brain of a puppy and despite him not actually being my dog, I miss him terribly! Here is a little slide show with a few cute pictures of him to share with you all!

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So, once Max had helped to cure me of my allergies, I decided it was about time I started to pester my parents into letting us have our own dog. Max unfortunately had bad hips so I couldn’t walk him and that was what I was craving, long walks with a dog in the fresh air. I started to win my mum around but my Dad was a firm and resounding NO. This got me thinking and I stumbled across the website Borrow My Doggy. This is a site where owners who need some car for their dog, be it a couple of days a week or just while they go on holiday, connect with people like me who want to have a dog but are currently unable to for whatever reason. It is £9.99 a year for a ‘borrower’ which entitles you to vet care 24/7 and you are covered by third party liability insurance once the dog is in your care. For an owner it is £44.99 per year and you are entitled to the same as the borrower.

I decided to sign up on a bit of a whim and immediately started contacting owners to try and find a suitable match. I was disappointed not hear back from anyone straight away and kind of lost interest for a few weeks. That was until I was contacted by a lovely lady who needed someone to help look after her 4 month old puppy. I mean, I was sold! It also turned out that she only lived about 5 minutes from my house so we decided to meet up and get to know each other and see if the puppy was suitable for us. I can honestly say that it was love at first sight for me and Martha. She is a black Jack Russell x Pug (Jug!) and has two white paws and a white belly. We had a few meetings after that and since September, I have been looking after her one day a week. She is absolutely adorable and the service has been great for me (and my mum who adores her nearly as much as I do!). I get the long walks in the fresh air that I have been craving and we curl up together afterwards and sleep on the sofa, it is the best arrangement I could have wished for! I will insert another bunch of photos here of my adventures with Martha for you all:

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She is such a beauty and her affection for me is something that I really treasure. Having her in my life has really improved my general wellbeing and Borrow My Doggy is a service that I would highly recommend to anyone who needs some doggy love in their life!! This post is not at all sponsored, both me and Martha’s owner have paid the fees to use the service and are both reaping the benefits it has to offer! Have you tried this service? If so what do you think of it?

As a dog owner I like the idea of this in premise – but I don’t know how people can ‘hand their dogs over’ into the hands of a stranger, personally I couldn’t let anyone take my dog who isn’t a family or friend – if he got stolen or lost – even by mistake, I would forever regret passing him over. There’s so many people stealing dogs at the moment I could never do it myself!

I know where you are coming from, I guess it is just based on trust and honesty. I would feel the same to be honest as trust is something that builds over time not in an instant but its also based on the idea that the owner knows their dog is being lovingly cared for one on one rather than with a dog sitting company who looks after multiple dogs at one.

Yeah – I’m not saying everyone is going to steal your dog, but equally someone could – it’s very easy to get around their verification process from what I’ve seen/heard. Like I said personally I couldn’t forgive myself if anything happened!